The “Raiing” is a small device that is placed under the armpit. Not only does it give the temperature of an individual, but it has the ability to continually track for a period of time, all the while having the information sent via bluetooth to an iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch. A “pre-set temperature” can be selected, and if it is reached or surpassed, an alert is sent to the mobile app. For anyone worried about their own temperature (or a child’s) throughout the night, this could really bring some piece of mind and perhaps a few less sleepless nights.

72 hours can be recorded before the information has to be synchronized with the mobile device, and a record can be kept as well — either on the phone, or on the cloud service provided by Raiing.

This image below is from the website, and shows a little bit how it works, and what the interface of the app looks like.

And here is an actual screenshot of the app:

This looks like it’s the first smart phone thermometer available, and it looks like it has been well-thought out. I didn’t see anything about pricing on the website, or the ability to purchase it, but the accompanying app can be downloaded here from iTunes (and is free).

I’d love to see this available for Android devices sometime in the future. Hopefully if it is successful on iOS devices, then it will be offered to Android as well. This is definitely something I would be willing to invest a little bit of money into getting.

Katie Clark is originally from Colorado and currently lives in Utah with her husband and son. She writes primarily for Smart Phone Health Care, but contributes to several Health Care Scene blogs, including EMR Thoughts, EMR and EHR, and EMR and HIPAA. She enjoys learning about Health IT and mHealth, and finding ways to improve her own health along the way.

Yesterday, I received an email from WebMD with news of a new app. It caught me eye, so I decided to look a little more into it.

The app is called Pain Coach, with the subtitle “A Better Day Starts Here.” For anyone that deals with any type of chronic pain, that is definitely a tempting proposition.

When a person goes to the doctor for any type of persistent pain, the doctor is ineveitably going to ask “So, where does it hurt?” Having been in this position myself, I usually draw a blank and give a very generic area — which could indicate a whole variety of problems. This app would be great for a doctor to “prescribe” to a patient who might need a little help pinpointing exactly where the pain is, what the triggers are, and how to describe that pain to the doctor. It would definitely make doctor’s appointments go smoother, in my opinion.

So let’s take a look at what this app actually has to offer.

First off, it is only available for the iPhone — sorry Android users (myself included!) The email I got listed the following features:

Doctor-approved information customized to your condition

A personal journal that tracks your pain level on scale of 1 to 10, as well as your symptoms, treatments, and triggers. Email a PDF report of your pain history in time for your next doctor visit.

Goals to help you manage your pain.

Hundreds of daily tips to help you achieve your goals

Here a few screen shots, provided by iTunes:

This shows a basic summary of a particular day. There is definitely a lot of detail, probably more than most doctors really would care about…but it seems pretty easy to track.

This looks like the pain identification center…once again, it has lots of details. I think pinpointing specific times and dates can really show specific triggers for pain.

And finally, here’s a picture of a graph that can be created to map pain over a certain period of time. I imagine this might be something a physician would be interested in.

As with most mobile health apps, this is a great idea . . . if people actually remember to use it beyond the first few days after the initial download. I’ve been thinking a lot about a post over at Happy EMR Doctor about patient engagement. What is it going to take for patients to actually use medical apps on a long term basis? Either way, I think this is a neat app, and I hope it becomes available for Android phones soon!

Katie Clark is originally from Colorado and currently lives in Utah with her husband and son. She writes primarily for Smart Phone Health Care, but contributes to several Health Care Scene blogs, including EMR Thoughts, EMR and EHR, and EMR and HIPAA. She enjoys learning about Health IT and mHealth, and finding ways to improve her own health along the way.